NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The Vanderbilt women’s golf team still believes its best golf of the spring season is ahead of it and will be hoping to carry some momentum into Ohio this week.
The Commodores begin play in the Columbus Regional on Monday and are part of an 18-team field looking to advance to the NCAA Championships later this month. Vandy is coming off a second-place finish to end the regular season and a fifth-place finish during stroke play at the SEC Championships last month.
“I’ve said from mid-February when we finally got everybody back and started having normal, routine practices, I really feel like our best golf is ahead of us. I think they’re really starting to jell, our chemistry is great,” Vanderbilt head coach Greg Allen said. “We got six girls in this thing that really care about each other and are really encouraging each other and are really pulling for each other.
“I’m excited and want to go up there and just do the things that we normally do. If we can do that we’ll be fine.”
Tabbed as the No. 6 seed this week, the Commodores will try to conquer the Scarlet Course at the Ohio State Golf Club. As an at-large selection into the field of 72, Vandy brings a No. 23 national ranking (by Golfstat) after recording three top-five finishes during the regular season.
Duke, the 2019 national champions, Arizona State, Virginia, Kent State, Georgia, Michigan, Clemson, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Illinois, New Mexico, Nebraska, Washington, Coastal Carolina, Campbell, Evansville and Youngstown State are also scheduled to compete at the Columbus Regional site.
Vanderbilt has balanced a strenuous week of final examinations and practice last week in its final days of prep. Allen said he hopes the end of the academic semester allows his team to relax and raise its game even higher.
Celina Sattelkau, Auston Kim, Louise Yu, Morgan Baxendale, Tess Davenport and Jayna Choi will make the trip to the Buckeye State in hopes of helping Vanderbilt advance to the next stage.
“We’ve prepared as well as we can this week. A lot of them went out and tried to qualify for the U.S. Women’s Open and that’s always a good tuneup for a Regional,” Allen said. “I’m excited about this group. I think they’re excited.
“We had a really good meeting (Friday) and the key for us all is just to remain calm and nobody reach for the panic button if you have a bad hole or a big number or a bad day. It’s a 54-hole tournament and we’re just trying to advance and finish in the top six.”
GOLF Channel will provide highlights from NCAA Regional play leading up to coverage of the NCAA Championships to be held at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Arizona. The low six teams and the low three individuals not from those teams from each NCAA Regional will compete at the NCAA Championships set for May 21-26.
The Commodores are scheduled to tee off at 9 a.m. CT Monday. Live scoring for the Columbus Regional can be found HERE.
“We talked about making a bogey or better score,” Allen said. “If we can do that then I think we’ll have a chance. If we don’t then we’re going to have to work really hard Wednesday.”
